This invention relates to a device for separating sheets from a supply roll of a continuous strip of material and more particularly to a device for separating bags from a roll of serrated bags.
In the packaging field, it is necessary and convenient to provide wrapping material in the form of a flexible sheet or bag in different width sheets or bags in a very limited amount of floor space. It is often necessary to supply the material in roll form whereby several rolls of varied size wrapping material can be made readily available in a limited amount of space near a packaging machine. Further, it is highly desirable to provide a means for an operator to easily and rapidly select and withdraw the right size of wrapping material for the article to be packaged.
While the present invention will be described in connection with particular embodiments relating to a dispenser-separator combination for dispensing plastic film such as plastic film bags for the rapid packaging of articles, it should be understood that the combination of the present invention is not necessarily limited thereto.
The packaging of products in sheets or bags made from plastic film presents a number of dispensing problems which burden overall packaging operation in a number of ways. In a typical operation, bags of like size are shipped flat or folded in half in quantities of as much as 500 to 1,000 or more. In one prior-art technique, like size bags are exposed in flat piles and tucked into a series of "pigeon hole" type recepticles from which the bags are selectively withdrawn as required. In another prior-art technique, bags of like size are folded over at mid-length and hung from a series of horizontally supported rods which are cantilevered radially from a rotable hub, like spokes on a horizontal disposed wheel. The spokes are rotated toward the bagging station in "Lazy Susan" fashion for selection of the appropriate size bags.
The bags, however, are large, limp and slippery. Unloading them from cartons and carefully loading stacks of them on such dispensers is time consuming and costly and often leaves them in disarray, requiring careful rearrangement. Once loaded, the subsequent removal of single bags from the stack often drags along additional undesired bags. The removal of single bags may also skew the remaining bags or completely dislodge them, causing them to slide to the floor. This slows the operation, raises cost, fatigues the operator, results in an untidy work station, creates contamination problems, particularly if food products are being packaged.
Another technique is in the form of rolled film material for dispensing one by one, e.g., rolled film or bags for home use is an everyday household commodity. These supply rolls are sold and used in individual containers which will have a tearing or cutting strip along one edge of the container for separating the material from the roll.
Another technique is wrapping material in roll form; such dispensers for multiple rolled film and bags are not new in the art. The same problems concerning dispensing individual bags from stacked bags also prevail when dispensing individual pieces of packaging material from roll stock, particularly when it comes to removal of the packaging material one piece at a time. U.S. Pat. No. 3,741,403 to Fleischer et al. discloses a rolled film dispenser of three units and each unit includes a storage roll trough and a dispensing trough. Each of the dispensing units has a wall portion having edges which converge upwardly to form a tearing edge. The same idea is also disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,045,883 to Andrews et al. However, when a piece of material is removed from the supply roll in either of these dispensers, the leading portion of the remaining material is not held in a ready to use position for an operator.
Further, the multiple sheet dispensing apparatus in U.S. Pat. No. 3,691,727 to Doerschein, comprises means for supporting supply rolls of flexible sheets and a dispenser having a pair of pivotal plates for supporting each of the sheets mounted on and extending between the plates and a check means supported by the plates and arranged to bear against each of the sheets on the respective support means, the check means is movable away from the support means by the sheet when said sheet is pulled in a direction of withdrawal, but otherwise holding the sheet.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,702,672 to Becht shows a dispenser for rolled plastic bags having transverse tear lines comprising a carriage with side by side roll support means and a material support member and forward on the carriage and opposite the roll support means is an upstanding fixed support panel with an elongate upper marginal portional curved rearwardly towards the supply roll and downwardly to provide a horizontal, arcuate head over which may be trained plastic material of the support rolls. The panel includes a forward projection adapted to direct the leading ends of the roll materials forwardly in spaced relation to the panel. There is a U-shaped elongate friction bar coextensive in length with the head disposed in space relation thereto so as to form therewith a vertical throat through which the rolled material depends while supported upon the head. The separator of this dispenser is not only complicated by its many parts but would be awkward and time consuming to maintain the material in an easy ready to use position; e.g., the requirement of threading the material through the vertical throat and keeping the material threaded therethrough.
Other patents of interest are U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,837,549 and 3,987,603.